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GENERAL ASSEMBLY, MAY SESSION, A. D. 1873. 



P 104 

u4 G5 STATEMENT 

Copy 1 



TOAYN OF GLASTONBURY 



CONCEKNING 



THJEIR I^ETITION 

vs. 

THE TOWN OF WETHERSFTELD 

TO MAKE T^E 

CONNECTICUT RIVER THE BOUNDARY LINE 

BETWEEN SAID TOWNS. 






HARTFORD: 
CASE, LOCKWOOD & BRAINARD, PRINTERS. 

1873. 




By tranKf"^ 
JUL! r 19GB 



TOWN OF GLASTONBURY 

vs. 

TOWN OF WBTHERSFIELD. 



General Assembly, 

May Session, A. D. 1873. 

Committee on JVew Toivns and Probate Districts. 

Petition to make the Conuecticut River the Boundary Line 
between said towns. 

The town of Glastonbury having appointed, at its adjourned 
Annual Town Meeting, held October 28th, 1872, the under- 
signed " a Committee to initiate and prosecute a Petition to 
the Legislature to obtain and secure the Connecticut River as 
the Boundary Line between said town and the town of Weth- 
ersfield," said Committee have brought such petition, dated 
April 16tli, 1873, which was duly served the 18th of the same 
month. 

At the time appointed by the Committee on New Towns 
and Probate Districts for the hearing on said Petition, May 
21st, 1873, in answer to a brief statement on our part, an 
elaborate printed answer was read before and placed in the 
hands of the Committee, on the part of Wethersfield, which 
contains so many errors of fact that your Petitioners are 
obliged, by way of explanation, to reply thereto and state 
some of the grounds on which their Petition is founded. 

It is claimed in our Petition : 

I. " That the Connecticut River was the ancient jurisdic- 
tion line between said towns." 
This is admitted to have been the case till 1770. 



II. " That the present divisional line between said towns, 
as claimed by said Town of Wethersfield, and admitted by- 
said Town of Glastonbury in part, crosses the said Connecti- 
cut River twice, leaving a large quantity of land belonging to 
each of said towns on the opposite side of said River there- 
from." 

We claim that the present line does not cross the river to 
Wright's Island. Wethersfield claims that it does. 

III. " That said Boundary Line, as it at present exists, is the 
cause of long and expensive litigation between said towns." 

This allegation Wethersfield, by their answer deny. 

1. We reply, as to the first point, by saying, as to the 
length of such litigation ; that for years the towns have been 
in controversy about the location of this line. As early as 
1844, the town of Glastonbury passed votes agreeing to sus- 
tain its citizens in paying their taxes ori this disputed land to 
our town, and in refusing to pay such taxes to Wethersfield. 
Glastonbury has collected those taxes, and Wethersfield has 
not attempted to enforce their collection. 

In 1870, Glastonbury brought their Petition to the General 
Assembly for the alteration of this boundary so as to make 
the Connecticut River the line. It was not supposed that 
there would be any opposition on the part of Wethersfield. 
They did however oppose it, and the Committee agreed, after 
hearing the case, to report in favor of the change desired. 
Subsequently, however, they agreed to recommend a continu- 
ance to the following General Assembly, on Wethersfield's 
alleging the necessity of viewing the line by the committee, 
and it was so continued. 

Pending this, the Town of Wethersfield brought their Peti- 
tion to the Superior Court for Hartford County, at the Decem- 
ber Term, 1870, instead of " the December Term, 1871," as 
stated in their answer, under the 16th section of the Act 
relating to Communities and Corporations. Said Court ap- 
pointed a Committee, which, after sundry resignations, was 
finally constituted as named in the answer. 

In 1871, a hearing was had before the proper Committee 
of the Legislature, but no suggestion to view the premises 



was made by Wethersfield. It is understood that a majority 
at least of tlie Couimittce were desirous of reporting in our 
favor on terms of pecuniary compensation from us to Wetli- 
ersfield, while a minority were unconditionally in our favor. 
We did not desire such a majority report, for if justice and 
equity gave us the line we sought, we should have had it with- 
out sale or denial ; if not, we did not wish it. The General 
Assembly continued the petition a second time. 

In April, 1872, a hearing was had by the Committee .of the 
Superior Court. Their report we will examine in the order 
of time. 

In April, 1872, after said hearing, Wethersfield brought 
their Petition to the General Assembly, asking for the restora- 
tion of the old line of 1770, so as to include the whole of 
Wright's Island on the east side of the river in Wethersfield, 
alleging among other reasons, that '' a part of the jurisdic- 
tional line between said Towns was and is uncertain, indefi- 
nite and unknown," and " utterly impossible to determine 
even approximately." Further stating " that so a part of the 
jurisdictional line between said Towns is unsettled and un- 
known, and that great and unavoidable confusion and per- 
plexity are occasioned to the petitioners and individuals." 
(What have the Legislature to do with private rights ?} How 
idle it is for Wethersfield to claim, as they do in their answer, 
the " repeated refusals" of our Town to perambulate a line 
" impossible " to ascertain, as a basis for their petition to the 
Superior Court to "■ fix and establish " a line which they thus 
characterize. A line, which, as we are advised, is impossible 
for the Superior Court or any Committee thereof to find, fix 
or establish. On the two petitions the hearing was had, and 
the Committee, by a majority of their number, reported a 
resolution making the River the boundary. All the manage- 
ment used by Wethersfield, and an inspection of the locality, 
at their urgent request, after the matter had been decided in 
our favor, (all of which was no doubt extremely patient and 
exhaustive on the part of Wethersfield) did not change the 
majority. The matter, by means of a course of procedure 
we never desire to have recourse to, was indefinitely postponed 



in the House, the resolution was passed by the Senate, the 
House adhered, and so the affair was disposed of for the time. 
The Committee of the Superior Court made their Report to 
the December Term, 1872, and the acceptance thereof is now 
pending. We are advised that that does not, as asserted in 
Wethersfield's answer, " fix and estabhsh " boundaries until 
it is accepted by the Court. Glastonbury does not propose to 
permit a Report to be accepted, if in their power to prevent it, 
which takes from our jurisdiction some 250 acres of land, the 
larger part of which we have had under our jurisdiction and 
control for nearly a hundred years. However " able " the 
Committee may be, they cannot establish a new line. They 
must find the old line not " substantially," but actually, a 
thing which Wethersfield said, less tban a year ago, could not 
be done, or else their doings are of no validity. 

The Committee of the Legislature, as well as the Legisla- 
ture itself, can judge whether, looking not only to the past, 
but to the future, our assertion as to the length of this litiga- 
tion is correct. 

2. As to the second point, the expensiveness of the litiga- 
tion caused by the present state of affairs, — the facts before 
recited imply it. Indeed, Wethersfield by stating that tliey 
have paid $729.88 for Superior Court Committee fees alone, 
does away with their denial. No injustice to either Town 
will be allowed by the Court in the taxation of costs already 
incurred. 

IV. Uur petition says farther, that the present line is " a 
source of great inconvenience and injustice to each of said 
towns and particularly to said 'I'own of Glastonbury." 

Perhaps we have stated it too broadly. It is, so far as we 
know, no inconvenience to Wethersfield to exercise dominion 
over this land on our side of the River. The only trouble 
and expense they have is to collect their taxes. In short, the 
miserable, venal argument of excess of taxes, is the ivhole animus 
of Wethersfield' s opposition to our claim. 

1. The line between Naubuc Farms and Wethersfield from 
1635 to 1690, and from that date to 1770, between Glaston- 
bury and Wethersfield was the Connecticut River. In 1770 



5 

an arbitrary line was established, in spite of our strenuous 
opposition, without a measurement or a monumeyit^ giving the 
whole bed of the ancient river to Wethersfield. At that time 
and for some years later, a ferry existed between these towns, 
so that the injustice of the line of 1770, in including land on 
the east side of the River, in Wethersfield, was not so marked 
as it has since become. 

In 1792, upon the Petition of James Wright, the then owner 
of Wright's Island, said Island was set to Glastonbury, 
thereby changing the line of 1770 westward where it struck 
the head of the Island in 1792. Neither of these lines has 
ever been legally perambulated, nor has any examination of 
the north part thereof been made by the authorities of these 
Towns for nearly 50 years. 

It is almost impossible to keep up bounds on this line if it 
can be found. The ice-freshets sweeping over these meadows, 
carry away the bounds, and the deposits made by the " fresh- 
et-floods" cover them up, so that their location is almost im- 
possible to determine. 

2. For 80 years, Glastonbury has exercised exclusive juris- 
dictional rights over Wright's Island and its accretions. In 
this, they arc justified by the Resolution of annexation, of 
1792. For the words making the western boundary of Wright's 
land the boundary between the Towns were stricken from the 
Resolution as originally drawn. 

3. Between the high land and the meadows is a tract of 
land lower than either, and in many places a stream or cove 
is to be crossed. Most of the pioprietors of the meadow 
proper have their private roads and causeways to get to and 
from their land. But these large tracts of land, on Wright's 
Island or the lower bend, and on Keeney's Point, require 
more expensive facilities for their accommodation. Glaston- 
bury has laid out and maintained for some 80 years a high- 
way from the main street to the land on Wright's Island. 
Siie has also built a highway, bridge and causeway from the 

•street to the land on Keeney's Point, across the Cove, and 
still maintains them at great risk and expense. All these 
improvements enure to the benefit of these tracts of land, in- 



creasing not only their market value, but their value for tax- 
able purposes. 

4. There are some 250 acres of land on Keeney's Point or 
upper bend, only about 20 acres of which are owned by resi- 
dents of Wethersfield. She has not taxed quite 200 acres. 
All the other proprietors reside on the east side of the River, 
and all, except one, are desirous, for obvious reasons, of hav- 
ing this land taxed in Glastonbury. 

In the mdidle bend are 200 acres justly belonging to Glas- 
tonbury, which Wethersfield, if she can be compelled to do 
her duty by the Courts, must accommodate. We have reason 
to believe that a majority of the proprietors owning land in 
the middle bend are in favor of our petition. 

The difference then is 50 acres in our favor, one section 
being as valuable as the other. Taxed at ilOO per acre, in 
the list, it will produce ahont one-quarter of the expense whicli 
Glastonbury incurs every year on the Keeney's Point road, 
bridge, and causeway. 

Wright's Island and all its accretions are ours, and whether 
it shall take a " long and expensive litigation" to establish 
the fact, will depend upon the reception of our petition in this 
case. 

These several blocks of land are owned almost wholly by 
parties on the same side of the River, and if any sales are 
made, the tendency of transfers is wholly in that direction. 

5. The general wear of the River, taking the entire length 
of our Town, is to tlie east instead of to the west. Such are 
the deductions of science, and so docs experience teach us. 

A glance at the map, or a view of the locality will satisfy 
any one that taking the River for the line, we shall from year 
to year lose as much or more land than w-e shall gain. It is 
not true that the encroachments are greater now than form- 
erly. The River wears both above and below this locality, but 
is everywhere except here, and in one peculiar instance in this 
State the line between the towns on its banks. 

No avulsion is to be apprehended, l)ut if one should occur 
it is far more likely to rush through the Glastonbury Cove 
than at any other point. There never has been but one such 



case on the Connecticut River since the settlement of the 
country — in the Northampton meadow. 

6. It is true that there are no human residents on the land 
in question. So much the easier to do justice to these Towns, 
and the more is it right that the land should go to the Town 
by whose expenditures it is benefited, when no person's dom- 
icil is to be changed from one town to another. 

7. Wethersfield, though one of the smallest towns in our 
State, is one of the richest, if not the most wealthy farming- 
town in proportion to its size. Her Grand List is nearly as 
much as ours, with not one-fonrth as much area. She has no 
large streams to bridge, and has to furnish highway facilities 
to only a -very limited territory. 

Glastonbury, although one of the largest towns in the State, 
has a large amount of rocky and mountainous land for which 
to furnish highways, many large streams over which she is 
obliged to erect and maintain some 40 large bridges, to say 
nothing of many causeways, small bridges, and sluices. 

Now as between these towns, it being, as it is, a new ques- 
tion, which has the equitable and just right to tax the land on 
the east side of the River? 

8. Besides. Wethersfield has never strenuously opposed 
the diminution of her territory, except in tlie cases of Wright's 
Island in 1792, and our petition to make the River the line. 
Is not the reason obvious to the most superficial observer ? 

9. The River is a pennanent line so long as it rolls from 
the mountains to the sea. No need of perambulations or 
controversy about that. If private individuals have contro- 
versies, let them settle in the proper tribunals. For a juris- 
diction line affects no man's title, either directly or indirectly. 

10. As to our position as a Town in this matter: a town- 
meeting was held on the 24th inst., at which, after a full dis- 
cussion and a thorough effort to get out all opposed to this 
petition, a motion to discharge the undersigned as a Commit- 
tee, failed by a two-thirds vote. 

We firmly believe that no person in Glastonbury who un- 
derstands this matter is satisfied with the line reported by 
the Superior Court Committee. And we are as confident, 



that this contest will continue with the candid approval of the 
great majority of our towtis-people until the Legislature shall 
fix a just and equitable line — they being the only power hav- 
ing authority to establish a boundary through the whole dis- 
tance in question. 

The Town of Glastonbury, 
By THOMAS H. L. TALCOTT, ) ^ ... 

THADDEUS WELLES, ^ committee. 

G-lastonhury, May 26, 1873. 



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014 107 135 P % 



